


Warmth in the Freezing Cold

by pikkugen



Category: Frozen (Disney Movies), Mumintroll | Moomins Series - Tove Jansson
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Elsa is the Lady of the Cold, F/F, Implied Attempt of Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-24
Updated: 2020-12-24
Packaged: 2021-03-10 21:40:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,413
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28284120
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pikkugen/pseuds/pikkugen
Summary: The Groke falls in love.
Relationships: Elsa (Disney)/Mårran | The Groke
Kudos: 11





	Warmth in the Freezing Cold

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Winter Solstice to all and sundry, especially the people of Varjis Discord, who encouraged me to actually write this story! Story inspired by unidentified (now unaccessible) fanart in Tumblr, probably, depicting the Groke happily carrying Elsa in a snowy landscape. You know the one. If you are the artist, know who the artist is, or even know if the art is accessible somewhere, please let me know! I'd love to give credit where it's due. 
> 
> (I love writing Moomins and was sorry the fandom wasn't eligible this year's Yuletide, so if you have any prompts, any at all, of any vague side character or small critter in the books, please throw them my way so I can write more!)

Can one miss something that one has never had? 

The Groke slides through the leafless forest. The ground freezes quietly under her soft paws. She leaves no trace; except for the frozen trail under the hem of her dark gown, no one can tell she has passed through the forest, and that's how she likes it. 

All life has fled, hidden either from the onslaught of winter or her, and she doesn't even notice. It has been thus for so long. She can't even remember how it is to be warm. Even in the warmest summer, she freezes the ground, and out of some kind of curious politeness, she keeps out of the valley during the summer months – mostly. She remembers times, oh yes, times and places when and where she has been lured by some inexplicable longing, towards something with a promise of light, of _warmth_ , of never again being this cold thing that everyone flees from. Promise of being _seen_. 

But any time she is seen, it is with terror and loathing. The little creatures of summer fear her and flee from her; does it count as being seen? No it doesn't. What they think they see is a cold shadow of a rock, not one of her own kind. 

Oh, there are other Grokes, she knows. Her kin haunt the rocky shores and rough hills, bestial, predatory. Warm-blooded, warm-bloodied they prey upon the unwary and the adventurous. She feels no kinship with them. None of them freeze the ground as they walk. None of them linger unseen in the shadows, none of them are silent. She is as far apart from them as she is from their prey. 

Soon it will be winter again. The snow doesn't see her, but it falls blindly over her, offering its cold cover on her shoulders. The ground freezes whether or not she treads upon it. Her own permafrost can do no more damage on the brittle life under her paws, the season has already done all it can. The strange creepers in the cold and dark ignore her as if she was one of their own. Then at least she can choose to believe it's because of the darkness that no-one sees her. It's a lie, of course, and she knows it; but such a comfortable lie. 

Besides there lies a temptation in the cold. Not of life and warmth, no! Like every living creature, the Groke is afraid of the Great Cold, the Lady of the Frost, the Ice Queen who brings the ultimate cold and freezes any living heart to stillness. To look her on the face is to see death. The Groke may be cold, but she is not immune to her chill. The Groke dreams of looking her in the face, and then she will never be cold and lonely again... but she is afraid nevertheless. There's no thawing from Death.

Can one desire Death and still be afraid to die?

The Groke slides through the freezing meadow. She doesn't dare to stop to admire the frosty landscape, because if she stands still for too long, the ground will die under her. Nothing will ever grow there any more. Small snowflakes flurry among the long, yellow stalks of grass, withered flowers and dry seedpods that rattle forlornly in the picking wind. The sea rolls its slowly freezing shoulders, its voice dulled and mumbling. The Groke remembers floating over the sea, on an ice raft of her own making, towards the enchanting ephemeral light winking on the mast of a small boat... a long time ago, and she was almost thawed then by its power. She remembers being seen. 

But that was a short while, and the little creature who saw her went away with the enticing lantern. She got cold again on that lonely island, over the empty winter, when everything and everyone from the island went away. She escaped her confinement when the sea finally yielded to the winter and froze over, and she wailed like a seal while gliding over the gelid sea back to the mainland and her cave on the Lonely Mountains.

And now it's winter again. The summer creatures are sleeping, or have migrated Southwards, and the winter creepers are shuffling in the shadows in their own furtive business. The few who are about stick to the swiftly waning daylight hours. Her loneliness grows with the lengthening night, and in the dark she howls towards the sea, calling out to her fear and her desire. The emptiness of the nightly sky and the frozen sea echo back her howl in a disconsolate counterpoint. She stands on a cliff, leaning taut against the wind, at the same time desolate and excited, and howls again. The mirror image of the tiny sliver of the moon is her mouth, the tiny stars glow wanly as her yellow eyes. Her despair cloaks her deeper than her robes.

Nothing responds. She shivers once, turns soundlessly and wanders down to the shore. The wind leans in from the sea, wrapping her in a cold embrace, until it falls again tired. She reaches towards the sea again, longing, yearning. 

The Great Cold is coming. She can smell it. The one whom no one has seen face to face without freezing to death. She is petrified – frozen! – of fear but reaches out eagerly, and even she doesn't know whether she is welcoming her own end or just wanting to risk everything for one glimpse of the indescribable. There is beauty to danger, and death.

The breath of cold precedes her. She is riding on a horse of ice, its eyes large and dark like mirrors of the sky. A wreath of frost lays on her brow, her trailing gown like blue snow. Her blonde braid falls over her lean shoulder, and her eyes...

The Groke forgets to fear. Her cold isn't intolerable, or so it seems; her smile is warmer than anything she has ever experienced before, and her impossible, clear, large eyes are blue like glaciers. She sees her. She _sees_ her, and smiles. 

Can one melt from the touch of ultimate cold?

The Groke slides through the piling snow and ice. She carries her on her arms, smiling like a fool. The Ice Queen smiles back at her, comforting, trusting, enjoying. She feels seen so thoroughly that she believes she should be transparent. 

Back at her cave she places her on the cold floor, where nothing will ever grow again, and she twirls lightly round, seeing everything at once. She looks at her, asking permission – twirls again, working her magic – and the desolate cave turns into a crystalline palace, with more cold beauty than the Groke has ever seen with her eyes. 

Except her. She is even more beautiful. The most beautiful thing she couldn't even have imagined.

And now they're dancing together on the glittering floor, her dark hem trailing behind her shining blue one, her dark ugly countenance flushed by the sight of her radiant one, her lumpy form following her nimble slender one. But her beautiful partner leans towards her to whisper her things of even more beauty: that she is beautiful too, that her strength and her scent and her smile have a rare allure, that her yellow eyes are like stars on a winter night and her wide smile is warm like a bonfire. And she whispers back, things she hasn't had words for before, of wonder, of worship, of wooing, until she laughs and spins her effortlessly on a large blue bed and her embrace, warmer than anything she has ever felt, sweeter than any nectar, encompasses her. 

And in the morning she wakes from slumbers so incredible, so rare, that she is certain she is still dreaming when the pale girl is still in her arms, breathing softly and still sleeping soundly. She cherishes the moment, studying her every feature to commit them to memory in case she disappears when she awakes... but the Groke does not awake, or the dream continues. 

Her breathing grows lighter, her eyes flutter, and she opens them like pools of clear water over a glacier, limpid and deep blue, and she smiles again as she wishes her good morning. She leans into a kiss and cannot believe her luck. 

”You're not cold?” she worries, as her beautiful guest lies naked on the icy bed. ”I freeze everything I touch...”

”Cold has never bothered me”, she answers, smiling.


End file.
